


All Made of Stars

by AKA_47



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-28
Updated: 2015-03-19
Packaged: 2018-03-15 13:42:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 13,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3449258
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AKA_47/pseuds/AKA_47
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"She’d built her shield, forged it from years of reporting from a war zone, from bruises and close calls and of course the scar on her abdomen that was the closest call of them all. She’d built a family to fill the hole that he’d left, soldiers who respected her, Jim who loved her, and she had Wade now, of course. A fiancé and a future. She was not the sad ex-girlfriend who’d left him in a whirlwind of snap decisions and escape plans. She wasn’t sure exactly what the hell she was, but she wasn’t quite that."<br/>Mackenzie tries to convince herself that she's found a home with Wade Campbell, but with Will back in her life nothing is quite as certain as she thought...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The World is Upside Down

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so this was just an idea that popped into my head, the idea that Mac would somehow meet Wade before she went to News Night. I'm kind of excited to see where it goes. I had to restructure the meeting in the first episode a little, but the basics of it should be the same. The story and chapter title come from the musical Finding Neverland, mostly because I just thought they were pretty. Enjoy!

Exes were supposed to walk out of your life. Will knew that. He knew it was actually kind of the point. Still, he watched Mackenzie’s Middle East reports with more regularity than he cared to admit. He waited for her to come home, even if he didn’t know what home meant for her anymore. Would she got to D.C., New York, Atlanta, or to England back to her family, miles away from him? If she went there they would never run into each other. He would never get to ask how she was doing. He would likely never see her again, and the realization hit him with a pang of regret that almost knocked the wind from him.

Yes, exes were supposed to disappear, supposed to move on, but _Mackenzie_ was different. Even if she was out of his life he still wanted…Well, if he’d learned anything from years of nervously watching her reports on the war, it was that he didn’t really want her gone at all. In fact, Mackenzie was the only thing Will really _wanted_ in his life. He wanted to pick up where they’d left off. He wanted to go back in time before she told him about Brian. He wanted more than anything for her just _not_ to have told him at all. But Will was an adult who absolutely did not believe in fairy tales. There were only facts.

FACT: He and Mackenzie had been happy.

FACT: She was the only woman he had ever wanted to marry.

FACT: She cheated on him.

FACT: They were over.

Even if he did see her again, that last fact would not change. Will’s life was not, had never been, a fairy tale. Not even close. It was best to keep expectations low, that way he couldn’t be disappointed. It was a lesson he’d learned early on in a childhood that was no real childhood at all, a lesson he’d allowed himself to forget with Mackenzie. He wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. No matter what Mackenzie McHale would be one of those exes who ceased to matter in his life. He would make sure of it.

\----

They met that first Christmas after she’d become an embed. She hadn’t been able to face visiting her parents, though they begged her too. She knew that they would see how much she’d been changed by it, that she hardly slept, startling awake to imagined terrors. She was afraid they would see how her thoughts spun, that sometimes she couldn’t speak under the weight of them.

She used Jim as an excuse (“I can’t leave him alone, not during the holidays, not after all he’s been through.”) and booked a flight to D.C. instead. It was a coincidence really, that two people who had no real reason to be there found one another, but as Christmas Eve “with Jim” turned into more than a few drinks at the nearest bar, Wade Campbell, who was seeking an escape from a visit with family, walked in and bought Mackenzie a drink. And though the last thing on Mac’s mind was a relationship, she allowed Wade to flirt with her, because it lessened the stab of loneliness in her heart.

She didn’t think about Will then. That came later, when suddenly she and Wade were celebrating their first anniversary over Skype and she wasn’t quite sure how she’d let it get that far, because whatever she felt for Wade was nothing compared to the love she still had for Will, even though the miles between them had relegated her to little more than Google searches and gossip.

But she’d seen Will’s face when she’d told him about Brian, endured his cold indifference as she prepared to go to the Middle East. Will didn’t forgive easily, and how could she expect him to, really, when she had broken what he so rarely gave? His trust.

She would have ended things with Wade if there had been even the slightest chance that she and Will had a future, but she’d left piles of emails that went unanswered. Will had given up on her. She was abandoned, and Wade wanted her. He made no secret of it. He was attentive and sweet. He Skyped, he called, he emailed. He listened when she spoke. She could love Wade, she reasoned, in time. It felt like love when she woke up after the stabbing to find him holding her hand, when he said all the right things about how much she meant to him, about how scared he’d been to lose something so precious. It felt like love when, in a trembling voice, he asked her to be his wife, even when she knew she must have looked like hell under the glare of the hospital lights. At least, it felt a lot like (almost) love as she found herself saying, “Yes.”

\----

“You don’t need to rush anything,” Wade said, straightening his tie before pausing to press a kiss to Mac’s forehead. “So, you don’t have a job right now. It’ll happen.”

She flashed him a smile she didn’t quite feel, flopping back down on to the bed, ready to crawl back into it despite the fact that at Wade’s insistence she had finally changed out of the oversized t-shirt she’d been sleeping (and living) in for longer than she cared to count.

“It’s been months,” she sighed. “I might as well just give up and take that job at _Lunch_.”

Wade sat down next to her, a hand on her thigh. “Mac, we’ve talked about this. The show’s not in New York and I can’t relocate right now.”

Years ago, before war coverage and stab wounds, Mac would have argued. She wouldn’t have cared about his career over her own, but it all seemed so terribly exhausting: the argument, the job, life…

“I’m just frustrated,” she said instead, closing her eyes.

“I know you are, babe. Something will come up.”

She shot him another half-smile.

“Do me a favor?” His voice was careful, and she peered up at his worried face. “Wait till dinner to have a drink today. I’ll bring home some wine.”

Mac stood up abruptly, running her hands up and down her arms as she crossed to the window, studying the skyline. She watched Wade shake his head in the reflection in the glass, watched as he came to her, but she still jumped as he wrapped his arms around her, dropping his head to her shoulder to speak into her ear.

“I just want you to take care of yourself, sweetheart. Stop worrying and go out. Have fun. Find a hobby. Make friends.”

“I could take up bowling,” she quipped.

Either he didn’t hear the sarcasm or ignored it. “That’s an idea.” His lips ghosted over her neck. “Love you.”

She hummed her response and then he was gone, leaving her alone in the deafening silence of the apartment, with only the chasm of her own thoughts as company. She had just decided that it was better to lose herself in sleep and thrown the bedspread over her head when her cell phone rang.

“Hello?” She answered wearily.

“Hello, may I speak to Mackenzie McHale?”

“Speaking.”

“Mackenzie, this is Charlie Skinner…”

\----

“You look amazing by the way.” Wade’s eyes scanned her appreciatively and Jim jabbed the button to call the elevator again, clearly uncomfortable.

_In comparison to her recent wardrobe of rags._ Wade didn’t say it, there wasn’t even anything in his tone to suggest it, but she heard it all the same. He was glad that she had finally begun to resemble a woman worthy of being called his fiancé. He’d gotten engaged to a work in progress, his own personal project, and she imagined that he felt the fruits of his labor were beginning to show.

He grabbed her hands, running his thumbs over them. “Don’t worry. You’ll be great.”

“I wasn’t worried,” she lied, “but thanks.”

She leaned in to kiss him quickly, noticing Jim shift his gaze in the opposite direction out of the corner of her eye.

“Love you,” Wade said as the elevator dinged its arrival and Mackenzie backed into it, following Jim.

“Love you, too,” she said automatically, just managing to get the words out before the doors closed.

Jim cleared his throat.

“What?” She asked sharply.

Jim shook his head. “Nothing.”

She raised her eyebrows at him, her eyes screaming skepticism.

He took a deep breath, forcing himself to meet her gaze. “I don’t like how he talks to you.”

“How does he talk to me?”

“Like you’re a little kid. Like you can’t take care of yourself. You’re stronger than that, Mac. He should treat you like it.”

“Am I?” She tore her eyes away from Jim, focusing instead on the elevator doors as they opened to reveal the _News Night_ floor…and a giant picture of Will.

She drew in a breath and forced herself to step out, telling herself that his rejection couldn’t hurt her now. She’d built her shield, forged it from years of reporting from a war zone, from bruises and close calls and of course the scar on her abdomen that was the closest call of them all. She’d built a family to fill the hole that he’d left, soldiers who respected her, Jim who loved her, and she had Wade now, of course. A fiancé and a future. She was not the sad ex-girlfriend who’d left him in a whirlwind of snap decisions and escape plans. She wasn’t sure exactly what the hell she _was_ , but she wasn’t quite that.

But here, back as an EP, she could be better than she’d been lately. She could settle, she could stop waiting. She’d been waiting for months, maybe years. To feel like herself, to feel sure, to feel as strong as Jim though she was. Sometimes she felt like the shield she’d built was cracked, like one wrong move could shatter it and leave her exposed. Maybe now she could repair it, make it stronger, make _her_ stronger.

She grinned back at Jim, “Ready?”

And he was, because she was leading. If only he could make her see that…

\----

Will hadn’t forgotten what Mac looked like of course. There were pictures from when they were together that he came across occasionally and a few reports she made where she was on camera. He thought that he’d committed her to memory, even as he tried to forget her features when they sprang up unbidden, but those images were nothing compared to how she looked as she strode into the newsroom, looking for all the world like she belonged there.

And God, she was beautiful. He watched from the doorway of his office as she hugged Don, chatted with his assistant, whatever the fuck her name was. Already making connections, building her home. She had a way of endearing everyone to her, and since he had been blustering around shouting at the now non-existent staff for as long as he had been at ACN, it was clear where their loyalties would lie. He couldn’t say he blamed them, looking at her.

But somehow she was all the more infuriating for her beauty and he knew unequivocally that he’d made the right decision in going to his agent and demanding the right to fire her at the end of each week. She had to go. Sooner rather than later. She was dangerous, impossible to hate when she stood in front of him, yet he had to hate her. His sanity depended on it.

He took a deep breath, standing looking at her wouldn’t make their meeting any easier. He walked over, forcing himself to keep going when she froze, wide eyed at the sight of him.

“Hi, Will. It’s good to see you,” she said, a little breathlessly.

She couldn’t mean it, not when he felt a physical pain just looking at her. “My office. Now!” He barked. He wheeled around, not bothering to see if she followed. He could survive the week…as long as he resolved to look at her as little as humanly possible.

 


	2. Tell Me Something

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Mac was engaged. It hit him with a dull thud that engaged meant that she would soon be married. Will had the distinct feeling that when she was, even if she stayed at News Night she would be farther away from him than she had ever been. 
> 
> Mrs.…Campbell." 
> 
> After the email debacle that sent the details of Will and Mac's breakup out to the world, Mac is forced to do damage control with Wade and finally tells Will that she's engaged.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was harder for me than it should have been, but I feel like second chapters are always the hardest. A bit of a time jump since the last chapter, but not too bad. The chapter title comes from The Wild Party. That's about it. Thanks for reading.

"You're mad."

 

It was the darkness that sent anxiety thrumming through her body, a preternatural black that was broken only by the blue light from the TV which set Wade's face in a ghostly glow.

 

Wade turned the TV off, plunging them into the pitch before he said, "Mad? Why would I be mad?"

 

It was silly to keep them in the dark when Mac was so close to a light switch, but she didn't move. Instead she cringed, preparing herself for the explosion she knew would come. "I know that was sarcasm. I should have told you about me and Will, but--"

 

"But you thought it would be better if I heard it on the news." Mackenzie watched Wade stand, no doubt staring at her, waiting for some explanation, but she could hardly tell.

 

"I was going to say that I didn't tell you because it doesn't matter. We're over. We've been over for years."

 

"You cheated on him?"

 

Mac's hands clenched into fists. It was none of his business. What had happened between Will and her belonged to them, which she knew was a completely ridiculous notion because she had basically told the entire world through email.

 

“Yes.” She spoke through her irritation. “In the beginning.” The distinction seemed important, even if it hadn’t mattered to Will.

 

Wade might have nodded. She wasn’t sure. “I’ve been wondering why you wouldn’t wear your ring to work. It makes sense now.”

 

She didn’t like his tone, hard, accusatory, like she’d been keeping an illicit secret from him. She was all too familiar with that tone from when she’d hoarded a secret from Will. _This_ was not the same. She didn’t deserve it this time. She’d done nothing wrong. Will was not a secret to hide. Their end had taken away any threat Will might have posed to Wade. What she’d done was just to preserve feelings and there wasn’t any harm in that.

 

“No,” she gestured wildly, more out of habit than anything, since neither of them could see beyond the vague figure of the other in the shadows. “I told you why I didn’t wear it. I wanted it to be between the two of us for a little while. When we have the wedding date set, I’ll wear it.”

 

Wade scoffed, a fuming snort.

 

“You don’t believe me.” Mac crossed her arms, her stance firm. Another shield against attack, another brace against impact. She was so damn tired of expecting the worst.

 

“No, Mackenzie, I don’t!” He yelled.  


She hated the way her name sounded coming from him like that, a twisted curse of a thing. “Right.” She turned on her heel, storming to the door and slamming it shut behind her.

\----

 

“I’m just saying, if you don’t get off your ass she might marry him one day.” Mackenzie watched Maggie and Don from across the bar, shooting Jim a look that she hoped conveyed the seriousness of the situation.

 

Jim shook his head. “Nah. She won’t marry him. They fight all the time.”

 

“Some girls like that,” Mac replied sagely, or as sagely as she could manage while tipping back her drink. “And besides, she thinks she loves him.”  


Jim raised his eyebrows at her. “How can you tell?”  


Mac gestured toward them. “Just look at her. Jim, you’re on a limited clock here, only about as long as it takes Don to get his act together and realize she’s too good for him.”

 

“But, if he thinks she’s too good for him…” Jim trailed off, confused.

 

Mac waved off his unasked question. “Doesn’t matter. He’ll marry her anyway. He’ll think she can make him a better guy.”

 

“Can she?”

 

It was Mac’s turn to be skeptical. “Not likely. She’ll get resentful and he’ll be angry, and before long they’ll be spending time apart and then they’ll get a divorce, at which point you’ll be married to some nice, but entirely boring girl and suffering a midlife crisis, but it’ll be entirely too late for you to do anything about it because life got in the way of the two of you.” She seemed to play out the entire scenario in one breath. Her eyes were too misty for their hypothetical future to warrant and Jim glanced sideways at her, concerned.

 

“You okay?”

 

Mac laughed mirthlessly, spinning in her seat away from Don and Maggie. “I don’t seem to be very good at anything other than work, Jim.”

 

“Wade?”

She nodded, closing her eyes tight. “Wade...and Will.”

 

Jim coughed which earned him a smirk.

 

“Not like that. There’s nothing going on with me and Will, but I didn’t tell Wade about him and now it came out in the news and he’s” she cast around for the right words, “not happy.”

 

“Why didn’t you tell him?”  


She laughed again. “I didn’t want to fight about it.” She laid her head in her hands. “The sad thing is I’m more worried about my inability to hold anything together than I am about the fact that Wade and I are fighting.”  


“Mac, don’t you think that means—”

 

She held up a hand to silence him. “I don’t know why I said that. I didn’t mean it. Of course I care that Wade and I are fighting.”

 

“Of course,” Jim said, and Mackenzie decided to ignore the skepticism in his voice.

 

“Hey, why don’t you invite Wade out with the staff, even Will if you want. Introduce him. Make him feel like he’s a part of this life. He doesn’t like feeling left out, Mac, that’s all.”  


Mackenzie hardly felt that that was all that was bothering Wade, but she smiled at Jim all the same. “That means I have to tell Will about him.”

 

Jim snorted into his drink. “Good luck with that.”

 

 

\----

 

“You have a fiancé,” Will said, in a tone he hoped was more nonchalant than it felt. He tapped a cigarette on his desk and leaned back in his chair, taking Mac in as she leaned against the doorframe, a hesitant (not quite) smile on her face.

 

She fiddled with the ring on her finger, something he definitely would have noticed before had she worn it, so it meant she must have been keeping it a secret from him deliberately. She nodded in answer. “Wade Campbell. I think you’d like him,” she lied.

 

He didn’t say anything to that. What could he say? _No, I won’t like him because he gets to have you and I don’t. No, I won’t like him because I resent that you’re dating anyone even though I’ve been parading women through here nonstop?_ Will wasn’t always very self-aware, but even he recognized the hypocrisy.

 

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

 

If she’d moved on than why didn’t she flaunt it, why didn’t she counter his dates with her own? She must have gone on dates with…Wade (God, he hated that name, even though he couldn’t exactly remember hating it until this moment).

 

Mackenzie bit her lip before offering an embarrassed shrug. “I thought it might be a little weird,” she admitted, “between us. Weirder than usual I mean.”

 

The corners of his mouth twitched a little at her attempt at a joke. “No,” he lit the cigarette, an excuse to do something other than look at her. “It’s not weird. This is exactly what’s supposed to happen.”

 

She didn’t look entirely convinced, but she clasped her hands in front of her and her smile grew a little more sure, a little less terrified at least. “Good, because he wants to meet you.”

 

“Mackenzie, I said it wasn’t weird, not that I want to be friends with the guy.”

 

“I know.” Mac stepped further into the office, leaning against his desk in a way that struck him simultaneously as entirely too close, yet not close enough. “But I didn’t tell him about us, and when it came out on the news,” she cringed involuntarily at the memory, “it seemed like I was keeping our past a secret, which I wasn’t.” She added the last part almost manically, like she needed him to believe her.

 

“So, now you want to show him we have nothing to hide,” he finished for her.

 

“Exactly and if he meets you he’ll realize that we’re finished.” Will barely held back from flinching. Had he really succeeded so well in punishing her? No, not _punishing_ her, that was definitely not what he’d been doing. He’d been moving on. Showing her that he was over her. That was all. Absolutely. He hadn’t done it to hurt her. He just hadn’t been considering her feelings…

 

“You can say all the terrible things about me you like.” Will forced himself back to the present so he could hear what Mac was saying. “Wade has seen me at rock bottom, so you don’t need to worry about scaring him off.”

 

Will’s eyebrows rose in surprise and he watched as the blush bloomed its way across Mac’s skin. It was obvious she hadn’t meant to say it, least of all to him, but she’d said it now. Rock bottom. Charlie had said she was exhausted, that she’d attended too many funerals. That would change her sure, but for _Mackenzie,_ who was always so reluctant to accept help or pity, to admit that she’d hit rock bottom, that brought a whole new gravity to what Charlie had said.

 

“Mac--”

 

She waved him off, stepping away from the desk. Fleeing to high ground. Already attempting to snatch back his memory of her ever having admitted anything. “I just mean that you don’t have to worry.”

 

“I’m _not_ going on a double date with you and Wade.” He said it with a smile. A joke that nonetheless made him want to gag.

 

The color in her cheeks deepened. “No,” she agreed vehemently. “Just come to Hang Chews tomorrow night. You can bring someone if you want.” She said it so casually, like the thought didn’t bother her, and for a moment Will found himself wondering if he had misread her reactions to his dates traipsing through the newsroom.

 

“I can do that.”

 

Mac let out a relieved breath. “You know, Will, I’m proud of us.” She was already out of his office, but she stood just outside, smiling broadly. He’d never quite been able to forget how infectious her smiles were and he fought hard to keep his own expression neutral.

 

“Why is that?”

 

“We’re acting like real adults, you know? Communicating.”                          

 

He gave a brief nod, which she took as dismissal and pivoted on the spot, headed to her own office. They had certainly communicated. Mac was engaged. It hit him with a dull thud that engaged meant that she would soon be _married_. Will had the distinct feeling that when she was, even if she stayed at _News Night_ she would be farther away from him than she had ever been.

 

Mrs.…Campbell.

Not his Mackenzie anymore, not ever. Sure, they’d been broken up for a long time, but even when he (tried to) hate her, she was always someone special to him. Soon even that right would be taken away from him. She would be just his EP. She hadn’t been just his EP in years, maybe not ever. Could he survive her working there if that was all she would ever be? Could he survive it if she didn’t stay?

 

No, he would survive. He’d done it before. Mac had a way of turning his world upside down, but he couldright it again. She hadn’t been _his_ Mackenzie since she’d slept with Brian after all. She was just his EP now, and if he’d ever thought differently it was just because having her so near had confused him, crossed the gap of time between them and warped his memory. He’d forgotten for a moment, but her email blast had confirmed the truth. The past had happened. The engagement was a good thing. The fact that she was marrying someone else (and here he had to force the thought out as though he were forcing words from a parched throat) was a good thing. He would meet Wade Campbell and thank him for cementing things once and for all.

 

 


	3. Who Are You Now?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I’m not sure I know anything when it comes to us, Mac.” Will heard her small intake of breath, but didn’t wait for her response. He wasn’t sure that she would even have one. He sure as hell didn’t. He pushed open the door and strode purposefully to his office as though nothing had happened. Maybe nothing had or maybe everything was different. Maybe it was too late, or they had changed too much, morphing into people who only vaguely resembled their counterparts five years before. He hadn’t lied, nothing ever seemed certain between the two of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I enjoyed writing this chapter much more than the last. I also like the content better. I hope the feeling is mutual. The chapter title comes from Funny Girl (in case anyone is curious, I write the chapter and then find a musical song title to fit-not the other way around). Hope you like it!

“He’s definitely not what I expected,” Wade said as Mackenzie emerged from the bathroom, brushing her teeth as she stepped out of her shoes.

“What do you mean?” She asked around a mouthful of toothpaste.

“Well, he’s not as nice as he seems on TV.”

Mac felt herself blush and wheeled around to the bathroom. “He was perfectly nice,” she defended as soon as she spat into the sink.

Wade gave a noncommittal grunt. “I just can’t picture you with him.”

Mac clutched the vanity, her knuckles going white. She worked to keep her voice even. “Why, exactly?” She eased her grip as she saw Wade come up behind her, plastering a hasty smile on her face. He pulled her hair free of its tie, and buried his nose into it as it fell around her shoulders.

“You’re so sweet and he’s so…sarcastic.”

Sweet. Her breath caught in her throat. It wasn’t that she didn’t appreciate being called sweet. She was polite enough. Her parents had been sure to instill in her manners. It was a good trait, one she would gratefully accept as hers, but it had never been her defining characteristic. She enjoyed smart and quick and even opinionated more than the diminutive _sweet._

“What’s wrong?” Wade asked, glancing up from his work kissing her neck.

She forced the smile to remain, “Nothing,” she vowed, but as Mackenzie looked in the mirror a feeling of dread came over her. Was this love more pretend than she’d realized? Was it changing her into someone she didn’t even recognize? She looked at the woman in the mirror and tried to remember that it was her.

“Hey,” he said, as though suddenly remembering something. “Was Will serious? Are you really American?”

She blinked hard into the mirror, banishing her thoughts. This was her life now. She’d chosen it and Wade had put up with so much for her, had dealt with more than it was fair of her to ask. “Doesn’t matter.”

\----

“A toast?” Charlie surveyed Mac across his desk and she had the disconcerting feeling that he could see straight through her. She fidgeted in her chair.

“To what?” She held the glass he’d offered her uncertainly in her hands, maybe because it was the middle of the afternoon.

He nodded to the ring on her finger. “To your engagement. Unless you’d rather celebrate something else?” His eyebrows rose.

“How about we toast to something we can both be excited for,” she hedged. “To _News Night_ 2.0”

Charlie’s eyes twinkled as he raised his glass and Mac did the same. “You really seem to have turned Will around to the idea. He’s not usually one for change, that one.”

“I’m not so sure I’m entirely to blame. He’s always wanted to do a news show he can be proud of.”

Charlie grinned. “He’s always wanted to do a news show _you_ would be proud of.”

Mac lowered her eyes to her drink so she wouldn’t have to look at him. “Charlie, I know you think that he does all of this for me, but he renegotiated his contract so that he could fire me. You overestimate my power here.”

Charlie got up, leaning against his desk. “I don’t think that anyone can overestimate you, Mackenzie. I don’t think you believe that either, deep down.” He paused, frowning down at her. “Mac, are you happy?”

“You’ve been amazing! Absolutely wonderful. Everyone has. I love working at ACN. I love what we’re doing here.” Mac blustered, stopping when Charlie chuckled.

“That’s not exactly what I asked.”

Mac swallowed hard around nothing in particular. “I know.”

Charlie laid his hand against her knee, bending so that their eyes were level. He could see through her. She was certain, but she wasn’t sure if she should be scared of it or grateful.

“You’re a good person, Mac, and you’ll try to make everyone else happy. It’s in your nature to care more about the people around you than you do for yourself, but you have to be happy too, okay kid? Because at the end of the day that’s all you’re really left with.”

Mackenzie felt herself nod.

“Okay, now go put together a great show.”

Charlie sighed as he watched her leave, wondering if she’d really understood at all, or if she had, if she could find the strength to do anything about it. He knew it was in there somewhere, buried under scars and pain and rejection and (assumed) unrequited love she was trying to deny. But Charlie was not about to let all of his orchestrations go to waste. Having a great news program under his belt was all and good, but he would find happiness for them, because it really was all that mattered in the end.

\----

“Have you set a date yet? I think you should set a date. I’ve never really understood people who are just engaged, like, for an indeterminate amount of time. It’s supposed to be a commitment to get married, not, like, a time to wear a fancy ring and hold your bourgeois French term for each other above all the single people. If I were engaged, I would want to be married like, immediately.” Sloan gushed, barely pausing for breath or a response from Mac who stared at her, dumb founded.

“What?” Sloan asked innocently.

“Sloan,” Mackenzie hissed, her eyes darting to where Will sat at the other end of the conference table. “This isn’t the time.”

“Why not?” Tess asked. A sentiment which was clearly echoed by Kendra who nodded emphatically.

“We’re all wondering,” she said.

“Some of us aren’t. Some of us just want to get through this rundown meeting so we can get to, you know, doing the actual news,” Jim interjected, and Mac threw him an appreciative smile.

“Shut up, Jim.” Maggie glared at him. “You’re such a kill joy.”

Will rolled his eyes. “Just tell them, Mac. They won’t be able to focus on their jobs until you do.”

Mac gaped at him, her heart suddenly in her throat. She didn’t want to tell Will. She wouldn’t let herself think why. He’d met Wade, assuaged his fears, and that was the end of it. Now, Mackenzie wanted to go on like they had been, like she wasn’t engaged. But she was and there was no denying it.

“Next May. The 7th.” She forced the words around the lump in her throat. If the news mattered to Will at all he didn’t show it.

“Okay,” he said, glancing around at all of them. “Got that out of your system?”

Sloan ignored him. She always did. “You guys are going to have such cute kids!”

Jim groaned, his head falling with a hard thud against the table.

“For the love of--” Will started, but Mac cut him off.

“I don’t want kids,” she said in a rush. “Now can we get back to this meeting, _please_?”

“What? Since when?” Will’s voice was quiet, and one glance at his shocked expression made Mac’s gaze fall to the floor. For a moment it was as if it were just the two of them, that the space between them was a hair’s breadth, and everyone else had disappeared.

_With Wade. I don’t want kids with Wade_. Her heart urged her to scream the confession across the table, but she couldn’t because it would mean admitting that there was only one person in the world she would consider having kids with, and she’d given up her chance of that years ago.

“I’m not sure when.” She spoke to the tips of her heels. “I just decided that it wasn’t for me.”

Neal cleared his throat. “In the interest of continuing this meeting,” _and making the rest of the staff stop squirming uncomfortably in their chairs, embarrassed_ , “would now be a good time to bring up Big Foot?”

Mackenzie smiled brilliantly at him. “An excellent time, Neal.” She leaned against the table, palms flat against the surface. “And the perfect time for me to tell you no, again, but thank you for your enthusiasm.”

Mac risked a glance back at Will, who was still looking at her as though he’d never seen her before. When he caught her eye he turned, pretending to focus on the story that Martin was proposing for the B block. He stayed quiet through the rest of the meeting.

“Mac, can you stay a minute?” He asked when the staff filed out of the room.

“Sure.” She sat back down as Will moved from his end of the table to hers. Jim’s eyes posed a question which she answered with a small wave of her hand, telling him to go ahead.

Will watched through the glass as the staff went to work, researching the stories she’d told them to delve into before the next meeting, tapping on their computers, making phone calls, so much more competent than he’d given them credit for at first. Mac had always had faith in them. She always had faith in everyone. In him.

“I’m sorry about earlier.” Will was still facing the glass, but he saw her hazy reflection in it and she nodded, knowing that he would see, that he would be looking even if he couldn’t bring himself to look _at_ her. She understood him so well. “Really, it was inappropriate. I was just surprised.”

As well he should be, since she had never said anything of the sort when they were together. Quite the contrary, she’d talked about having a family like it was an inevitability, as sure as her next breath.

Mac crossed her arms, warming herself, though she wasn’t technically cold. There was a chill in the pit of her stomach that had nothing to do with the recycled air of the building. “It’s okay, Will, honestly.”

“Does Wade not want kids?” The words left his mouth, unbidden. He was sure that that was the explanation, that instead of saying _he_ doesn’t want kids, she had placed the blame on herself. She was good at that, taking blame.

She stood up, erasing things from the board to distract herself. “No, I think he does actually.” Will turned to look at her, but her back was to him. At his silence she let out a long sigh. “I decided to focus on my career. I’m pretty good at it.” She gave him a smile over her shoulder which he tried to return, but didn’t really feel.

“You’re good at everything, Mackenzie.” Will shoved his hands into his pockets and hung his head, but it didn’t matter how small he made himself, it didn’t take away the enormity of his words, or the way they made Mac’s heart skip a beat.

“Thank you, Billy,” she said earnestly, loving how it felt to use his old nickname, like they were close again, like they had started to mend what had broken between them. Then of course there was the way that he said her name, like it was something precious, not just something to be tossed out at random. Something special. He’d always made her feel like she was special. She supposed she’d always done the same for him, before.

“Yeah, well.” Words failing him, he crossed to the door, hoping to make a speedy exit before he embarrassed himself any more.

“Wade said I’m too sweet for you.” Mac wasn’t sure what made her say it, maybe just to stop him from leaving.

Will’s hand stilled on the door, but he didn’t turn around. “That’s probably true,” he conceded.

“You know it’s not,” she said quietly. He could feel her eyes boring into his back. He didn’t dare look at her.

“I’m not sure I know anything when it comes to us, Mac.” He heard her small intake of breath, but didn’t wait for her response. He wasn’t sure that she would even have one. He sure as hell didn’t. He pushed open the door and strode purposefully to his office as though nothing had happened. Maybe nothing had or maybe everything was different. Maybe it was too late, or they had changed too much, morphing into people who only vaguely resembled their counterparts five years before. He hadn’t lied, nothing ever seemed certain between the two of them.


	4. This is How it Feels

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "He tried to erase the space with his words, but it stubbornly remained, so much farther than he wanted, yet nothing in comparison to the gulf that really existed between them what with her fiancé and his anger. They’d created that with their choices. Small ones and gargantuan decisions that had somehow led to this moment. They all added up to rules, rules about how they could interact, what they could say, what they could do. Will couldn’t do anything about the paths they’d already taken, but this space—the one in his apartment—he could do something about that."  
> Mac reconsiders her engagement to Wade and Will is there to listen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I must have rewritten this three or four times and I was really afraid that it was never going to get to a point where I liked it, but it did. I guess this technically takes place after "I'll try to Fix You" given what Mac knows, but the timeline for this has gotten a little out of hand, so it falls wherever really. The chapter title comes from South Pacific. Only a couple more chapters left. Hope you enjoy this one!

She was suffocating. Wade had met her when she was broken, when she was happy to let someone else speak, because the effort of it was too much, and now that she was strong again, now that she was back doing something that she loved, with people who trusted her and followed her and waited for her opinion, she wanted to be heard again. But that was not how they operated, her and Wade. She nodded. She agreed. She placated. It seemed the least she could do when he had spent months trying to keep her from getting drunk before noon and falling into a near coma of depression. It hadn’t made her unhappy at first, when all around her was nothing but pain she tried to numb with alcohol. What she had with Wade wasn’t pain, then, not in comparison.

Now it was a slow, torturous suicide. She listened to Wade breath beside her and couldn’t help but imagine that with each one he flickered out some bit of flame inside her, that he was stealing all the oxygen from it until it was nothing but a dull glow. And then what would she be? Mrs. Wade Campbell, erstwhile award winning executive producer. It wasn’t even his fault. He hadn’t even asked it of her. He hadn’t demanded that she change. He’d been nothing but kind. How could she explain that his kindness was killing her? He wouldn’t understand, not when she’d done nothing to suggest that she was unhappy. She had no idea how to even begin to explain that even just laying there next to him her lungs felt thick and heavy, like she was drowning, drowning in the very idea of spending the rest of her life with him.

If she admitted it she would hurt him. He would never trust her again. She’d meant it as a kindness, this deceit, but it wouldn’t matter, not to Wade. The lie would make him question everything. She had experience with that kind of thing. She could stay silent, she could spare him the pain like he’d tried to protect her, but if she saved him from the truth would she be sacrificing herself? Would she feel this way forever, like he had stolen all the air from her, or would she get used to it, the lead weight natural and expected? More importantly, did she want to find out?

Mackenzie twisted her engagement ring around and around her finger, until she couldn’t any more, until her hands trembled with the fear of what she contemplated, until the bedspread on top of her felt like a vice, until the very apartment seemed to constrict around her. She swung out of bed, practically flinging the ring onto the nightstand, where it spun on its side. By the time it had settled, Mackenzie was gone.

 

\----

 

He lived alone, but Will’s apartment was never silent. He filled it with the noise of the many TVs, of music and city sounds caught from the open door to the balcony. He hated silence. In his experience, quiet only meant the calm before the storm. It meant the other shoe was about to drop. He’d learned to fear it, so he didn’t hear the elevator ding its arrival over the drone of the news, didn’t hear as Mackenzie stepped into the dining room, but he did catch her silhouette in the glass and he turned sharply, almost certain he was losing his mind, that he was making a habit of hallucinating her. 

“Mac.” He half rose. One glance in her direction told him that she wasn’t here on a social call (not that they were in that stage of their relationship anyway, a phone call was about as close to informal as they got these days). Her hair was in a tangle and she was wearing jeans, a rare enough occasion made all the more strange by the fact that she was wearing a t-shirt that was ratty and swallowed her whole. “What are you doing here?” 

Mackenzie tried to smile, but it shook, falling into a frown. She opened her mouth, but let it fall shut again before she made a sound. Her arms were tight against her chest. Something inside Will snapped at the sight of her, some tether which held together all of his anger and indignation, because it was impossible enough to hate Mac when she was raging against him, but altogether unthinkable when she looked like that.

“You’re shaking,” he said, feeling panic begin to flood him. For a minute he wondered if he should touch her, if it was his place. It was only a moment, and in the next she was pressed against him, her head braced against his chest. “What is it?” He asked in a whisper, combing his fingers through her hair.

“I don’t understand you.” She pulled back from him, spinning away and starting to pace.

Will tried to ignore how he hated the space between them, how much he wanted to reach for her and pull her back to him. He ran a hand over his face as though to clear his thoughts. “Okay. That’s what’s bothering you?” 

Her pacing had brought her to the opposite side of the room. She slid down the wall, drawing her knees to her chest. Will hated when she made herself small, when the weight of the world settled on her and brought her down to the ground, when she was clearly meant to stand tall.

She shook her head, but a “yes” seemed to come, unbidden, from her mouth. “You put a non-compete clause in your contract. You gave up _3 million dollars._ You’ve done everything in your power to be able to get rid of me, but here I am.” She threw her hands up. “Is it to torture me?” 

There was no malice in her voice, only resignation, and the sound of it pierced his heart. “No,” he said vehemently, “absolutely not. That was months ago, before I actually saw you, before we started working together. You’re not going anywhere.”

He tried to erase the space with his words, but it stubbornly remained, so much farther than he wanted, yet nothing in comparison to the gulf that really existed between them what with her fiancé and his anger. They’d created that with their choices. Small ones and gargantuan decisions that had somehow led to this moment. They all added up to rules, rules about how they could interact, what they could say, what they could do. Will couldn’t do anything about the paths they’d already taken, but this space—the one in his apartment—he could do something about that. He joined her on the floor, across from her. 

Mac laid her chin on her knees, watching him wearily. “Why, then? Why won’t you let me go?

_Let me go_ , like she was trapped. Will distinctly felt his heart skip a beat. “Do you want me to?” His voice was barely a whisper, softened by the fear of her answer. If she told him that what they had would disappear, that she wanted to go and leave him behind, could he go back to how it had been before? Could he build the wall back up that had kept him from forming any real relationships? _No._ He wouldn’t do that, but he wasn’t sure he could survive without it either.

“I want you to answer me, because I think you know the thought of not being around you scares the shit out of me, but if this is a game for you, if you just want to punish me…” Mackenzie blinked rapidly against the threat of tears. “I’m getting married, Will.” 

He nodded robotically. “I know.” It hung between them always. This thing, this person who had her when Will did not. Wade had made choices too, the right ones, the ones that led him _toward_ Mackenzie rather than pushing her away.

“What I mean is, if this is just a game to you, then I should go right now. I should get as far away from you as possible and marry Wade. He’s a good man who wants to take care of me. I should let him if all you want from me is the satisfaction of knowing that you can still hurt me.” 

“I don’t want to hurt you!” Will practically shouted at her. The accusation was absurd. He didn’t want to see her in pain. He didn’t want her to be broken. But she wasn’t entirely wrong, there had been a certain satisfaction in knowing that what he did still mattered to someone, to _her._

Mac held her hand up to stop him. “You are the master of deflection. I’m only saying that if it’s like some kind of sport for you--” 

“And if it’s not?” Will’s words seemed to be swallowed up by his own heartbeat, but Mac heard them all the same.

The corners of her mouth quirked slightly before they slipped down again. “Then you’re right. I’m not going anywhere.”

Will stood up, suddenly too nervous to sit. There were no words, no words for what they were doing, what he was doing by asking her to stay, what she would do if he didn’t. He couldn’t find the words for that, but finding them for her relationship with Wade was easy enough, so he settled for them. “You don’t need anyone to take care of you, Mac.”

“No,” she said slowly, “I don’t think I do.”

He stared down at her. “Then why would you marry him?”

Mac stood up, biting her lip. She looked afraid again, like she had when she’d first come in, like she didn’t want to tell him, or was terrified of what would happen if she didn’t. He wasn’t sure which. “He loves me.”

“So does Jim. You didn’t try to marry him.” There it was, sarcasm. His defense mechanism, because he felt Mackenzie’s fear as though it pulsed through him too. He’d built defenses against fear, better ones than he’d built against Mac, he guessed. But in the end, he’d always wanted to let her back in. He’d let her chip away at them one by one.

Mac glared at him. It might have been fake, but he could never be sure with her. “I’m petrified.” She continued solemnly despite his joke. “I’ve been so selfish and if I break his heart, what does that say about me?” She looked at him as though she wanted an answer, but didn’t dare wait for it. “But I want to be selfish, Will. Sometimes I can’t even breathe thinking about _the rest of my life_ with him.”

Will wanted to stop her. He wanted to tell her that she wasn’t selfish, that she was the most selfless person he’d ever met, that she should do this one thing for herself, this one monumental thing. She wouldn’t believe him, not when it had been her actions that had put an end to them. It didn’t make a difference because as always, when it really mattered Will was speechless.

Mac sighed, summoning strength for what she was about to say. “It’s the right thing to do. For him. Because I made him think it’s what I wanted. I think it was, before.”

“What changed?” Will heard himself ask.

A tiny smile flitted across her face. “You really shouldn’t ask questions you already know the answer to, Billy.”

Will shook his head. “I’m _not_ a good reason, Mac. Jesus, I’m all for you not marrying him, but don’t hang your reasoning on me.”

“But it _was_ you, Will. You reminded me of the person I used to be. A person I liked.”

“Even when we were shouting at each other?” He tried to lighten the weight in his chest. He wasn’t completely sure if it was fear or joy.

“Especially then.” Her smile was genuine then, and throwing caution to the wind she drew her arms around him again. “It’s not the right thing for me, Will.”

He breathed a sigh of relief. She would be alright. No matter what, she would take care of herself.

He let his chin drop to her head. “It’s not a game,” he promised.


	5. The Right Regrets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> . It was as though he’d lost her and found her again in this moment. Will had morphed Mackenzie in his mind: into a villain, a liar, but by the time the real Mac had come back into his life she had changed herself [...] She wasn’t one thing anymore than he was [...] but from the moment he’d met her he’d put her on a pedestal. She was strong and beautiful and so…unwavering, that when he’d learned that she had failed to live up to those standards, he’d had no choice but to tear the pedestal (and Mackenzie) down. Now, another choice came to him, one that he hadn’t seen those years ago. Mac was many things, multitudes. She was human, and he could accept that despite everything she’d (they’d) done wrong, she’d done so many things right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a lot of fun with this chapter, making Wade a little bit nasty and adding a little bit of silliness to the serious situation. I hope I hit the right balance. The chapter title isn't technically from a musical, it's from Smash, but it's close. Thanks as always for reading.

For the love of god, what the _fuck_ was he doing? Will had told her that it wasn’t a game, he had let himself imagine that all those intervening years had never happened, because there was something so comforting about holding Mackenzie. What he’d felt when they were together—complete and content, like he had some direction, he wanted that again. He had the sneaking suspicion that that was something only she could instill in him, like she held some key to understanding Will that even he didn’t have, like he kept ramming against a locked door that wouldn’t budge. For years he’d felt that way, felt like she had stolen that key with her betrayal, but then she’d come back and despite the fact that she’d lied to him, that she was engaged to someone else, she still was able to make his life make sense and just…damn her.

It was not a game. It was the most fucking serious he’d ever been in his life. He wanted her there, he wanted to make sense again, for everything to be clear. He wanted to tell her that he’d never quite been able to hate her, more than that, that he’d never been able to quite _not_ love her. But what god damn good did that do? So, he still loved her. So, he wanted to work with her and sometimes despite himself he really just wanted to wrap his arms around her and never let go, but those things didn’t change the past (did they?) and nothing would ever be clear with her again.

Will knew that Mac still loved him. He’d have to be blind not to see it, especially after tonight, and that was why she couldn’t marry Wade, even though he was good to her, he took care of her and Mac might not _need_ it, but she deserved someone who would lift some of the burden off of her shoulders every now and then. Mac loved Will and (god help him) he loved her, so it wasn’t a game. But was there any hope for them? Did she need there to be, or was it just that she needed a promise she wasn’t going to be tortured by him anymore? Maybe she just needed him to let her know that it was okay to love herself again, that she could stop punishing herself with distant, dangerous assignments and apathetic relationships. He could stop punishing her if it meant she could forgive herself. He could do that for her, even if he wasn’t sure of anything else.

\----

“Mackenzie!” Wade’s shout was muffled by the glass walls all around them, a point which he must have taken into account because he punctuated his yell by pounding on them so hard that the glass rattled. Mac tried very hard not to groan as she turned around to look at him, especially because Jim and Will had all risen from the conference table in almost perfect unison, ready to jump to her defense. She waved them down.

“I can handle it guys. Jim, take over?” She stood up just as Wade began another round of knocking.

“Mac, I can--” She had no clue what Will was going to suggest he could do, since she sincerely doubted _him_ talking to Wade would be a very good idea, especially considering she would have to explain that she’d spent the night on his couch, waking up to find the go bag from her office lying on the floor next to her and a Starbucks cup on the coffee table.

She smiled at him, trying not to read too much into the kindness he had shown. Will was a good guy. Of course he would think of what she would need. She tried not to focus on how it had felt very much like coming home. “It’s fine,” she assured him, before turning to Wade. “I’m coming.”

“What the hell?” Wade threw up his hands before the door had even closed behind her.

She touched his arm, easing it back to his side. “I’ll explain.” She looked back to the staff to see that all eyes were glued to the two of them. Tess was slapping Tamara with the back of her hand, pointing unnecessarily while Gary whispered to Jim, no doubt digging for information that she knew Jim wouldn’t give. Wade followed her gaze. At least he had the decency to look embarrassed. “Come to my office.”

She lead the way, her steps strong and purposeful. She felt oddly like she was about to let down a candidate for a job. _I’m sorry, your interview went very well and your accomplishments are quite impressive, but we’ve selected another candidate. It’s nothing you did. Better luck next time._ He certainly followed her like he was expecting bad news, and how could he not, when she had disappeared in the middle of the night without even bothering to call? He didn’t try to touch her and didn’t speak until she had closed the office door behind them.

“You left this.” He pulled the ring from his pocket, holding it out for her in the flat of his palm.

She felt herself blush. “Wade, I…”

Wade barked out a laugh, mirthless and deep. “Take it, Mackenzie. I’m sure it just slipped your mind, right? You meant to put it on before you left.”

Slowly, tentatively she reached out, curling his fingers as gently as she could over the band. “Wade, I’ve been unfair to you. I think I’ve been waiting for you to change your mind, or to have some reason to stop this--”

“ _Shut up._ ” His voice was soft, but all the more insistent for it. “Jesus, you couldn’t think of a better way to tell me? I’ve been scared out of my mind all night because you just decided to change your mind? I knew you were a mess, but my god. Act like an adult for once, Mac! You can’t expect everyone to forgive all your mistakes anymore. Don’t you get it? This isn’t something you can come back from. Once you do this, I’m not coming back.”

She blinked at him, reminded all at once of what fear and betrayal could do to a person. It was a major feat to let someone into your life, to arm them with the power to love you, and inevitably, to hurt you. She knew that. Will could still hurt her, even after she had hardened herself against so much, because he was one of the few people she had ever let love her. Even Wade, who had never said anything but kind words to her could snap, because he had trusted her with something so precious. She had even expected his reaction, but still her mind raced as it tried to reconcile the man she saw before her with the one she had known. She felt her limbs go rigid. She was a statute. Nothing he said could hurt her. At least, that was the theory.

“I know.” Her voice was soft where her intent couldn’t be. “I’m so sorry Wade. I really did think I could make this work, and you’ve been wonderful.” She took a step forward, to comfort him? She wasn’t really sure, but he flinched back from her.

“You do not get to do this,” Wade snapped. “Not after all the shit I put up with.” He waved his hands in front of her as though he could physically encompass all the kinds of fucked up she had been after the stabbing. “You don’t get to decide I’m not good enough because you’re _all better now._ ” The last part came out in a sneer, his lip curling.

His fists were clenched so tight she imagined the ring must have been cutting into his palm. It was only with great effort that she kept her own fingers from curling, kept her voice even. It was not her heart that was breaking, she reminded herself. “I am better now,” she said as evenly as she could manage, “and it’s because I’m better that I know you don’t deserve this. I’m not who you think I am, Wade. I might have been once, but neither of us would be happy if we went any further with this.”

“Happy.” The word was almost choked with tears, but it was too angry for that. “Why do you get to decide what makes me happy?”

Mac shook her head. “I don’t. I can only make decisions for myself.”

Wade glared at her. “And you’ve decided that I’m not good enough.” He looked suddenly as though he had come to some epiphany and Mac swallowed down the unease that filled her at the sight of it. “Where were you last night?”

She bit her lip. Hard. If she told him, it would sound like she’d deceived him. She would never be able to explain that Will was the only person who could understand, the only person she wanted to go to when she was so lost. A sensible person would lie. She could say she went to a hotel. The result would be the same. They would be over. It didn’t matter. But she wouldn’t lie to him, not anymore.

“I was at Will’s.”

“Of course you were.” Mac wasn’t entirely sure whether her conscience had conjured the words or whether he had actually said them they were so quiet.

For a split second Mac thought that he would walk out without another word. He turned to the door and she made no move to follow, but then he spun around and flung the ring at her. It fell to her feet with a soft _clink._

“Bitch!” He wrenched open the door and Mac was so dazed that she didn’t at first notice that he had stopped short.

“What--”the words died in her throat as she saw what it was that had made him pause. Will had taken up the entirety of her doorframe, blocking Wade’s path.

“You should watch your mouth.” He said with a false calm that was accompanied by an equally false smile.

“Will, don’t.” Mac stepped closer, not quite putting herself between them.

Will didn’t break his apparent staring contest with Wade even as he answered her. “I’m just giving Wade a refresher course on what it means to be civilized.”

Wade scoffed, the trance brought on by Will’s unexpected appearance broken. “I’m not the one who made a fool of myself on national TV for years. I’m not the one who took advantage of Mackenzie’s pitiful _obsession._ What did you two do last night, huh? Is it going to be just another thing you can use against her because she’s too stupid to put as many miles as humanly possible between you?”

Will was fast, but Mac was faster. She was good at reading Will. She always had been, but it wasn’t a necessary skill to see that Will was going to punch Wade in the face. It wasn’t a necessary skill, but it gave her the few seconds she needed to plant herself firmly in front of Wade. She held up her hands. “Hey,” she said, with the air of talking a suicidal man off of the Brooklyn Bridge. “It doesn’t matter. I know it isn’t true. He’s just mad. He doesn’t mean it.” Will glared at her. “And even if he does,” she conceded, “it doesn’t make any difference. I don’t want _you_ to get hauled off to jail because of him.”

“Self-defense! Wade threw the first punch. I was a witness.” Mac peered out to see that Don was raising his hand and apparently parroting what several of the other staff members were ready to testify to, given the number of hands in the air.

She tried to scowl at the eavesdroppers, but couldn’t quite manage it, like a mother who was secretly amused by the antics of a misbehaving toddler. “Don’t you have work to do?”

“Nope.” He shook his head resolutely. “We belong right here.”

Mac rolled her eyes. “Regardless, no one is punching anyone. Wade is going to walk out of here _unharmed,_ ”she threw pointed looks out at the group, “and we’re going to go back to work. Understood?” She took the grumbles as assent.

Gingerly she stepped out from between the two men, half expecting to have to dive into position at any second. Will backed away from her door under her unwavering gaze and Wade shoved past him. Mac stooped to pick up the ring and followed after him.

“Wade!” He stopped his march through the bullpen, but didn’t turn to look at her. She came around to face him and his eyes shifted to the floor. “In spite of what I just saw,” she said in a low voice that only he could hear, “I know that you will make someone very happy someday.”

She held the ring out, waiting until his eyes came back up. He reached for it, his hand lingering over hers. “Did you ever love me?” He asked, his voice cracked and broken.

“I loved a lot of things about you.” She pressed the ring into his hand, pulling her own away.

Wade’s answering laugh was breathless. “That’s not really the same thing.”

“No,” Mackenzie agreed, “it’s not.”

“I loved you.” There was an accusation in his voice. She understood it, expected it if she’d expected nothing else about this confrontation.

“You loved someone like me, and that’s not really the same thing.”

Wade shook his head, “I’m sorry,” he said. She didn’t ask if he meant for throwing the ring, or swearing at her, or if he was just sorry that he’d ever met her. She wouldn’t have blamed him for any of it. He stepped around her. She didn’t turn to watch him go, and if she felt sadness, it was nothing compared to the relief that flooded her. A silence so complete had fallen over the newsroom that she could hear the elevator doors slide shut and it wasn’t until that moment that she released a breath she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding.

Apparently everyone in the vicinity had been feeling the same thing and a collective sigh fell over the room. Mac met Will’s eyes and she offered him a small smile.

Jim was the first to break the silence. “Thank god,” he said.

Mac backed against one of the desks, feeling suddenly exhausted. She laughed. “You mean you didn’t like him, Jim? I’m shocked.”

“Finally!” Everyone turned to see Charlie stride in. Before she knew it Mac was being crushed in a hug.

“How long were you watching?” Her question was muffled and he pulled her to arm’s length, looking her up and down like she had suddenly undergone a metamorphosis.

“You think I’d miss that soap opera? Sloan told me Wade was down here looking pissed as hell and I came right down.” Sloan grinned sheepishly at Mac. “I saw the whole showdown. I nearly jumped in there myself when I heard what he called you, but it seemed like you guys had it covered.”

“I didn’t realize you were so involved in my personal life…”

“Please. I’m an old man. What the fuck else is there for me to do besides meddle in the lives of you young people? What _did_ you two get up to last night by the way?” Charlie’s eyes glinted as he looked between Will and Mac.

“Nothing!” They answered together.

Charlie grinned, giving Mac’s shoulder a squeeze. “Good job, kid. Made me proud.” He walked off to the elevators without another word, an unmistakable bounce in his step.

“Well, that wasn’t weird.” Mac said. She shifted her heel against the carpet. “Do you think there’s any chance we could all get back to work now?” She knew even as she asked that it was hopeless, but they at least pretended to be busy as they all gossiped about what they’d just seen.

Will watched as they milled around, blindly picking up folders and tapping on keys. He shoved his hands into his pockets. “You should have let me punch him.”

Mac shook her head. “It’s not like him. He’ll feel bad enough about it in the morning and _I_ don’t need to be in any headlines thank you very much.”

“Mac, I don’t want to overanalyze this right now, but I’m really glad you’re not marrying him.”

She smiled. “Maybe you’re not as mad at me as you think you are.” She looked down at her ring finger, at the line where her engagement ring used to be. It wasn’t a scar. It would disappear with time. She didn’t have to add it to the tally of bad decisions that would leave a mark on her forever. It was just a line. The memory would fade with it.

When she looked up Will had crossed the distance between them, not quite as close as they had been the night before, but closer than they’d been in so long. Her heart leapt. “Maybe I’m not.” He looked her over. By some miracle they were here. She hadn’t died in Islamabad, he hadn’t drank himself to death. He wasn’t in some relationship that only existed because Mac would hate it and she wasn’t marrying Wade. There weren’t oceans between them, or even anger. “I’m done hurting you, Mac. I never should have done it. You don’t deserve it.”

Her life had been so full of scars. She was used to healing, holes of her soul forcibly fusing together, trying to bridge an angry gap against all odds. She wasn’t used to healing without the fight, the survival mode. She wasn’t used to the balm that forgiveness could be. “I’m not sure that’s something you can promise, but thank you.”

Will started to reach for her hand. It was so close, resting on the desk. It _almost_ felt right, but he’d seen the mark of her engagement ring too, and more than that he felt the shadow of his own pain in what had happened to Wade. He tapped his fingers on the desk to cover his hesitation.

Mac pushed herself to full standing. “Part of me was looking for an excuse,” she confessed, backing away from him toward her office, “last night, not to marry Wade, but I don’t need one. I did this for me. I’ve made a lot of mistakes, Will.” She met his eyes in a way that was almost an apology, “but this wasn’t one of them.”

And there she was. It was as though he’d lost her and found her again in this moment. Will had morphed Mackenzie in his mind: into a villain, a liar, but by the time the real Mac had come back into his life she had changed herself. The images jumbled in his mind, the small, sad girl who had come into his apartment, the confident woman who had finally admitted what she wanted…and didn’t, just now. She wasn’t one thing anymore than he was. He wasn’t perfect, and if anyone knew that it was Mac. She knew all of his insecurities, all of his weaknesses, but from the moment he’d met her he’d put her on a pedestal. She was strong and beautiful and so…unwavering, that when he’d learned that she had failed to live up to those standards, he’d had no choice but to tear the pedestal (and Mackenzie) down. Now, another choice came to him, one that he hadn’t seen those years ago. Mac was many things, multitudes. She was human, and he could accept that despite everything she’d (they’d) done wrong, she’d done so many things right.


	6. That's the Way it Happens

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This, finally, was what it felt like to come home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I literally stared at this chapter nonstop for 7 hours today, so while I'm not completely satisfied, I think my sanity dictates that it's finished. None of the chapters have been very exact in their timeline, but I'm going to say that the last chapter took place on or around January 10, 2011. This chapter starts after the episode "Bullies" (without the engagement ring retribution) on April 27th and ends on May 1st, which is of course, "5/1" This is the end except for an epilogue I'm writing as the last chapter. The title comes from State Fair and I hope you don't have to stare at this for the better part of your day to make sense of it.

**April 27, 2011**

 

It took her a while to learn to like the company of her own thoughts again, in the silence of an empty apartment, about as long as it took for the tan line on her finger to fade. But Mackenzie learned. She made herself forget the weight of the ring and all of the promises that it had held. She taught herself to be alone for the first time in years, because the loneliness of a warzone was not the same, when she was too distracted to remember that she was thousands of miles from everyone and everything she’d loved. Being on her own in the midst of everyday life was different.

Sometimes it was too much, and the nightlight didn’t quite penetrate the darkness and the silence was so complete that she could feel it pressing in around her. She had to go outside on those nights, lost in the noise of the city, surrounded by people. Sometimes (often, if she was being honest) Will called to talk about the show, and his voice filled up the silence. It wasn’t easy, but as days stretched to weeks and then months, she fell into a routine.

There was something to be said for not having to worry about anyone else. (Except Will. She worried about Will when he called late at night and she caught the sadness in his voice even as he joked. She worried when he didn’t call, too, especially after the death threat, when the stillness of her phone nearly sent her over to his apartment. Just to check. She worried and he called and it made her feel less alone).

Will was in therapy again. He’d kept his promise not to hurt her, and she was rebuilding her life, and the show was going really well. It almost felt like a dream, and a few months ago she might not have believed it would all old together, but Mac was starting to lose the anxiety that had plagued her since she’d first left the U.S. to cover the Middle East, the fear that she would never feel whole, her happiness never complete. She’d lost confidence in herself, but she was strong, she knew that now. Everything would be all right.

\----

“Tess wants us to remind people that there’s a royal wedding in a couple days. As if anyone could forget.” Will opened the door to the control room and Mac followed him out, pushing her glasses up to rest on the top of her head and rubbing the bridge of her nose. He watched her. He didn’t really pretend not to anymore, but she didn’t mind. She smirked and Will knew he was caught. He coughed to cover the awkwardness.

“That’s because Tess wants to go on assignment to cover it.”

“It’s nice to dream.” She pressed her back to the wall, not wanting to move, not wanting to go out, to their separate offices.

“I’m assuming you have something else you’d like to devote the time to.”

“Oh, I don’t know, a Libyan civil war, a deadly protest in Yemen, the fact that the president released a birth certificate he never should have had to in the first place.” She ticked them off on her fingers.

“So, not much then.”

Mackenzie laughed and Will ran his fingers through his hair as he smiled. “Plenty of time for the Duke and Duchess.”

“I think we should have a party,” Mac said suddenly, staving off the silence that threatened.

Will cocked his head. “A party?”

“To celebrate _News Night 2.0_ ”

Will looked past her into the bullpen, where the piecemeal team that had been patched together from people she’d brought in and whoever had been foolish enough to stick with him after Don left were working to create the show he’d come to love. They were young and inexperienced, but they loved what they were doing and because of that they succeeded, despite all odds. It was something to celebrate. For them, for him, for Mac.

“And where would this party take place?” Will asked because he knew the answer.

Mac brushed her bangs back from her eyes, making them all the more wide and irresistible. “Your apartment. This Sunday?”

Will groaned, but she knew it was for show. “There’s a lot of expensive stuff at my apartment, and all those people…”

She slapped his arm. “You could afford to replace it all if you hadn’t given up 3 million dollars just so you could fire me.”

Will threw up his hands. “When am I going to live that down? Jesus, you make _one_ mistake.”

“One?!” And because she liked arguing with Will more than she liked having a normal conversation with nearly anyone else in the world, they didn’t get back to their offices before the next rundown meeting.

\----

“Okay, I’m taking bets,” Martin said, leaning conspiratorially close to where Jim and Maggie were working.

“On what exactly?” Jim asked, glancing up at Martin, following the direction of his eyes to the hallway of the control room. Mac was leaning against the wall, laughing at something Will had just said. He was smiling at the effect of his joke (at Mac’s smile, Jim guessed. It was hard not to marvel at that). They looked for all the world like a couple and Jim didn’t have think very hard to guess what the bet must be.

“I don’t want to get involved,” he said, hiding a grin behind his computer screen.

Maggie snorted. “Oh, okay, because you didn’t get involved _at all_ when she was with Wade.”

Jim shook his head. “Completely different. She asked me a question and I answered.”

Maggie rolled her eyes. “All right goody two shoes.” She missed Jim’s affronted expression by virtue of casting her attention to Martin. “My bet’s they’ll be making it official in a month.”

“Two weeks!” Neal called from across the room without even glancing up from his computer.

“Shh,” Jim admonished. “They might hear you.”

Martin clapped a hand on Jim’s shoulder. “That’s the beauty of it,” he stage whispered. “They’re so happy they won’t care.”

Maggie sighed wistfully. “They’re good for each other.” Jim looked at her. She was still watching Will and Mac, and even if she wasn’t, she never seemed to notice the affection he was sure was there every time he looked at her. He was glad for it, mostly, except when he wasn’t, particularly when she was making out with Don while he was in the vicinity.

“Yeah,” he said without taking his eyes off her, “they are.”

\----

“I would make a pretty good anchor you know.” Mac leaned back in the chair, propping her legs up on the anchor desk. The rest of the staff had gone home and the office was quiet behind them. By some silent agreement she and Will had stayed, taking stock of everything they had built.

“If you’re about to start imitating me I’m leaving, and I’m shutting the lights off when I go. And you would hate my job, by the way.”

She eased her shoes off, placing them beside her before replanting her feet on the desk, ankles crossed. “Don’t worry, I couldn’t do the accent and I would hate your job, but not as much as you would hate mine.”

Will knew that he wouldn’t just hate it. He would be terrible at it. He could never do half of what she managed in a day, but he only shrugged. “I couldn’t do the accent.”

She glared at him. “Ha. Ha. I would throw my shoes at you if they weren’t so beautiful.”

“You’re beautiful.” The words were out before he could stop himself, but he couldn’t even bring himself to regret them. There was something inevitable about them, he and Mackenzie, like they were just waiting for some sign or spark to bring them together. He wasn’t sure whether that was a conclusion he’d come to on his own, or whether Habib had managed to draw it out of him, but the more he’d talked in the sessions, the more he realized that he couldn’t change the past, but he could choose his future, and more than anything he wanted Mackenzie in it.

Her eyes lost every trace of the glare they’d held, replaced instead by a shine that looked like hope and tears had mingled. “Thank you,” she said breathlessly, her legs dropping almost automatically to the floor.

It seemed to Will that his walk around the desk over to her was a mile, and she followed his progress with those same, hopeful eyes. “I’ve made more than one mistake. I’ve made a hundred, at least, where we’re concerned. I should have listened to you years ago, because when you—when you love someone, you don’t let them walk out of your life, and you sure as hell don’t kick them out of it.”

Mac looked like she had ceased to breathe, and he felt like he’d forgotten the mechanics of it too. He reached blindly for her hand. “I love you, Mackenzie and by some miracle I think you love me too. I’d like another chance. I know I’ll make more mistakes, and there’ll be days you’ll wish you’d never come back here but, no, this got off track.” Will cut his hands through the air as if to erase all that he’d just said. Mac let out a sound that might have been an attempt at a laugh, but was too breathless for it.

“What I’m trying to say is that I love you, and there’s nothing more I want than another shot at this with you.” He looked down at her, his hand tightening over hers. “It would be great if you would say something, not that I’m pressuring you. I know that a lot has changed, but just, say something.”

Mac pulled herself up, reaching on her toes to bring her lips to his. “Nothing’s changed, not how I feel about you.” She wrapped her arms around his neck, her heart pounding in time with his.

Will let his hands slide through her hair, across her cheeks, traced her lips, because he could. Because he felt like he could spend the rest of his life recommitting her to memory and it wouldn’t be enough. “That’s a yes, then?”

She kissed him again, smiling against his lips. “I love you, Billy. Now, shut up and kiss me.”

Mac directed him a lot. It was part of her job. Sometimes (to her fury) he didn’t listen, but that was the easiest command he had ever had to follow.

\----

**May, 1, 2011**

Mackenzie was in his apartment, and she looked like she’d always belonged there. Will watched from across the room as she chatted with Charlie, who kept glancing between the two of them because even though they hadn’t said anything about their relationship, Mac had been the one to answer the door for him, and Will suspected that they didn’t hide it very well. He certainly didn’t feel like he did. He was sure he was transparent as Saran wrap.

Her touch at his elbow startled him out of his reverie. “You should say something.”

Will nodded. “Right.” Because he didn’t want to keep it a secret anyway. He never wanted to pretend he was anything less than 100% in love with Mackenzie ever again. He grabbed her hand and pulled her forward with him.

“No—Will, I meant about the show,” she hissed, trying in vain to yank her hand back.

He smirked at her. “I know what you meant. Everyone!”

A hush fell over the room, until of course they noticed that Will and Mac were holding hands, at which point Kendra gasped, Neal’s eyes widened, and several losers of the bet groaned. Maggie leaned over the back of the couch, a wide smile on her lips.

“First of all, thank you all for coming…to my apartment. Incidentally, if you break anything you’re fired. As you know that this party is to celebrate the one year and one week anniversary of what we used to call _News Night 2.0._ It is what it is because of all of you, but I think we can all agree that none of this would be possible without Mackenzie McHale. We owe her a lot. Me especially, mostly for deciding I was worth a second chance.”

Gary started clapping, which turned into such a raucous applause that Mackenzie blushed. “You’re dead,” she mouthed as she fitted herself to his side.

And just like that the _News Night 2.0_ celebration became so much more than just a party. It had brought them all together, changed their lives irrevocably. The show had lead all of them home, to what they loved to do, to where they belonged. Of course, no one owed more to the reinvented _News Night_ than Mackenzie and Will and as they were surrounded by friends, people they thought of as family, wishing them well, taking part in their joy, they were acutely aware of it.

“Am I forgiven?” Will asked as Jim broke out a guitar at her request.

“No,” she said, with a distinctly unconvincing smile. “Just you wait until Sloan finds out you told _everyone_ while she was on a plane.”

“Shit.” Will ran a hand over his face.

“Don’t worry. If you’re nice to me, I’ll protect you.”

He brought his mouth close to her ear, his voice more breath against her skin than words. “What should I do?”

“You can start by singing me a song. Go.” She pointed over to Jim.

“Start by?” He asked, eyebrows raised as he grabbed his own guitar. She nodded, though she could hardly hear their song over the roaring of her own thoughts, swirling through the whirlwind that was the last year (years) of her life. A year ago, she’d had no job security, no hope of even being cordial with Will. She’d had a mountain of insecurities and Wade to make sure that the mountain never crumbled, hovering, placating, but never really listening. Now, she had a family. She had Will and she had the staff. She had a show they could all be proud of. Mackenzie had gotten everything she’d ever dreamed of.

Mac knew that it wouldn’t be perfect. She wasn’t cut out for perfect. She was made for messy and complicated. She could handle anything so long as she was surrounded by the people she loved. Will. They could conquer the world as long as they had each other, Mac was sure. They could both survive alone. They’d done it before, but Mac couldn’t deny the relief that washed over her as she caught Will’s eye and the smile he gave her told her that she would never have to be alone again. This, _finally,_ was what it felt like to come home.

 


End file.
